Ali may not be the greatest but he has the greatest signature win

Louis-Schmeling I...June 1938...Yankee Stadium...prelude to WWII...how can it be anything but?

 

He has a point. Foreman wiped out the man who beat a young Ali, the latter at the time looked easily like the greatest heavyweight since Joe Louis. The Ali win cannot be underestimated, and it's the only thing that makes me respect people whom put Joe above Foreman (though I feel George was the greater fighter from a career perspective).

Ali in the 60s was like a sports miracle imo. What he achieved throughout his win and reign is evident on video. For Frazier to beat him (we're talking about an Ali still only just-turned 29 years old) was ample proof that Frazier was not only the best in the world, but an ATG.

I guess one of the things that bothers people about Frazier is the fact that the Ali win was so far ahead of any other victory he ever had. He never beat anyone anywhere near the quality of Ali before then or after.

Foreman's ridiculously easy annihilation of Frazier might have been the single greatest win. But I still say Ali was the greatest overall: on paper 2 wins Norton, 2 wins Frazier, mostly dominating kayos of seemingly indestructible Foreman and Liston....wow.

 

Excellent. Foreman was considered unbeatable and a huge favorite. Louis' bad camp is well documented and was actually spoken of even prior to the fight against Schmeling.

 

Pretty hard to turn a blind eye to Foreman's incredible KO of Frazier as well as his pure devastation of Norton. These simply cannot be cast aside. Foreman's KO of Frazier is one of the greatest wins in history. He backed it up a year later with Norton to prove he wasn't a flash in the pan. With results like this you don't need numerous wins over mere contender level fighters.

What heavyweights have two better wins than Foreman's over Frazier and Norton? Even more so when we dictate in a three fight period.

Louis did not have anything like Foreman's win over Frazier/Norton at the time of Schmeling, not even remotely close. His poor camp was also well documented. GREAT effort by Max but not on Ali's level by a considerable margin imo.

 

Do you mean besides Ali? Of course, not in a three fight period.

 

2 points I think are very overlooked and in fact never get bought up or seriously considered are:

1.win is that Foreman had a lack of rounds going into the bout, 7 rounds in the last 2 years.

2. Foreman apart from his wins over Norton and Frazier, lacks any wins that we’re really worth noting.

Louis has wins over Carnera, Baer, who held the title less than a year prior to the bout in 6 and 4 rounds. We can make the argument that Baer clearly wasn’t prepared, but that same argument can be made for Frazier. You also have Levinsky in that run of 3 fights.

If we are rating Foreman and Louis purely on what they’d done up to the bout, Foreman does nick it, however Louis went on to dominate the division for x amount of years, whereas Foreman beat basically beat Ron Lyle and retired for 10 years.

 

Ali is the actual opponent the OP talking about so besides Ali. Even Ali can't match the 3 fight period.

 

sort of depends how you define 'signature' win?

 

I was going to say this too.

If signature win is the best win of an established all-time great then Ali-Foreman would certainly be part of the conversation and near the very top at heavyweight.

If signature win is the best win of any fighter, great or not, that brings in every major upset in boxing history. Randolph Turpin's win over SRR on that basis would be hard to beat. I don't think that's what we're talking about here, though.

 

After all this conjecture I think Frazier-Ali really might be the greatest win.

 

Well I guess it depends how you define signature win.

Lewis beating Tyson was probably his signature win, but pretty trash, so I’m starting to understand where you’re coming from,

I guess Frazier in FOTC would be my pick to usurp yours.

 

And the FOTC is a fairly bulletproof choice imo. Though Ali had changed his style some during his comeback, all you have to do is watch his comeback wins to see he was without question, easily the best heavyweight in the world at the time...besides Joe. Add to that the fact that many people still considered Ali champion at the time, and most were already considering him as an ATG.